


You're In a Car With a Beautiful Boy

by Skaboom



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Introspection, M/M, Slight Future Fic, pining to a degree
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:01:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28370547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skaboom/pseuds/Skaboom
Summary: On a drive back from a fight to protect Beacon Hills, Theo contemplates his feelings for Liam...and Liam's feelings for him, as the two of them head back to town together.
Relationships: Liam Dunbar/Theo Raeken
Comments: 8
Kudos: 55





	You're In a Car With a Beautiful Boy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Underthegallowws](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Underthegallowws/gifts).



> This was written for Gallows, because they are a wonderful, shiny, lovely person who deserves a little something. They asked for a fic based around a poem, so I did my best.
> 
> This fic is based on a poem by Richard Siken which can be found [here](https://onlymorelove.tumblr.com/post/166880655978/and-you-feel-like-youve-done-something-terrible) along with some cool gifs!

**You're in a car with a beautiful boy** **  
****  
**Theo kept his eyes on the road, his hands at ten and two, as he drove his truck back towards Beacon Hills. He did everything that he could to keep his gaze from wandering to the passenger’s seat, where Liam was sitting, covered in dirt, and dried blood, clothes torn, just like Theo’s.  
  
In the three years since Scott had left, Liam and Theo had somehow become the protectors of Beacon Hills and the surrounding area. Mason and Corey, as well as the others, of course, all helped when they were in town, or when they were most needed. For the most part, however, it was Liam and Theo, holding down the fort, with Deaton as their go-to aid.   
  
Tonight, they were driving back from what had wound up being an all out brawl with a nasty coven of hags that were terrorizing a small town outside of city limits. It had been challenging, but Theo and Liam were an in-sync force to be reckoned with, and though it had been far from an easy fight, they had emerged victorious.

  
Even covered in grime, and caked in dried blood, though, Liam was beautiful. He was strong, fierce, a survivor, and all of that appealed so greatly to Theo. He knew he couldn’t dare to take his eyes off the road to look at Liam, or he may well never stop. He would never be able to forgive himself if he crashed a car with such precious cargo. He wouldn’t know how to.   
  
Liam’s beauty was inside and out - it radiated off of him, like an aura crafted especially for Theo, and he was captivated. Theo was sure there wasn’t a person alive who could rival him, and Liam may not have been “his”, but he was his to protect, and Theo was determined not to fail. After all, he had a flawless record when it came to protecting Liam. he had no plans to lose that now, so he looked straight ahead at the road before them, content to bask in the glow of Liam’s beauty, of his “goodness”, and focus on getting them both home safely.  
  


**And he won't tell you that he loves you, but he loves you.** **  
****  
**Theo wasn’t sure when he realized that Liam loved him, but he had known it for awhile now. It wasn’t something that had happened all at once. It wasn’t the sort of thing where he had gone to bed one night unaware, and awoke the next morning certain of it, but he knew.  
  
It had occurred to him slowly, through subtle changes in the other man. There were changes in Liam’s anger - he went from yelling at Theo for putting Liam and the others in danger, to yelling at Theo for putting _himself_ in danger. It wasn’t just that, either. The way that Liam spoke to him changed, the way that Liam looked at him changed. Hell, even the way that Liam _stood_ around him changed. At some point, Theo had noticed that Liam angled himself towards Theo, whether he meant to or not, when they were together.   
  
And then, of course, there was Liam’s heartbeat. Theo wasn’t sure when he had started noticing the change there, but where Liam’s heartbeat had once been even around him, it was more erratic. At first, Theo had thought that he had done something, something that caused Liam to feel more anxious around him, but rather than pull back, Liam was coming around more, spending time at the shitty studio apartment that Theo rented, with his rapidly beating heart and his softer words, and Theo?   
  
He just knew.   
  
He also knew that Liam would never say it. He and Theo worked together well, but Theo still struggled with the rest of the pack, including Corey, and that was a problem. Corey and Mason were engaged now, and would likely be together for the rest of their lives. Mason meant more to Liam than just about anyone else, and Corey? Theo had done a lot of harm there. If Corey was wary of Theo, then Mason was wary of Theo, and if Mason was wary of Theo, then Liam would stay away. Not in the most over arching way, of course. He and Liam would still work to keep Beacon Hills safe together, and maybe they’d go back to one of their apartments together and lace a beer or two with dried, crushed Wolf’s Bane and drink, but that was it.   
  
Theo knew that Liam loved him, and he knew that Liam wouldn’t say it, because it would hurt people that Liam loved, and Liam? He was loyal. He wouldn’t do anything to challenge or risk his relationship with his best friend, even if that meant denying himself the man he loved.   
  
Theo admired that.  
  


**And you feel like you’ve done something terrible, like robbed a liquor store, or swallowed pills, or shoveled yourself a grave in the dirt, and you're tired** **  
****  
**Theo hated that he had Liam’s heart, though, because Liam could do so much better. It felt terrible, knowing that he had stolen something that deserved so much more. There were a million wonderful people out there, every one of them could make Liam so much happier than Theo could, but Liam’s heart was with Theo, and he knew that, and thus, he hated it.  
  
It was a bad place to be. He knew that he could ruin it, that he could give Liam his heart back by causing harm to the pack. He could take a swipe at Mason, and lose Liam forever. He could put Scott, or Lydia, or someone else in harm’s way, and he knew that if he did it with enough intention, he could make Liam fall out of love with him, he could show Liam the monster that he was, and in doing so, set him free.   
  
But he didn’t, because at the crux of who he was, Theo was still selfish, and Liam? Liam was the best thing that he had ever had, and it didn’t matter what capacity he had him in, because Liam as a friend was much better than Liam as an enemy, or even worse, perhaps, Liam as _nothing_ .   
  
Theo knew that he should pull the car over. He should yell at Liam, he should throw stones, he should pull a _White Fang_ , a _Harry and the Hendersons,_ and send him away for his own good, but he couldn’t do it. As much as he was sure that it would be the right thing for Liam, he couldn’t do it, because Liam was the only person that would get in the car with him alone. Liam was the only person that trusted him fully, and if he deserved that trust, he wasn’t sure, but he wanted it, and he was selfish.   
  
Selfish, and exhausted from pretending that he was fine on his own. A lone wolf? Maybe that was the best path for him, and he had been so sure of that for so long, and then Liam had come out of nowhere, like a guiding light, pulling Theo towards some new direction, down a path towards good, rather than evil, and it was conflicting, and it was hard.   
  
Theo stayed awake at night, trying to rationalize himself, but _he_ didn’t make sense. He knew that he was evil, he had done such monstrous things, but at the same time, he was trying. He was trying his best to be good, to help out, to save the day instead of destroy it.   
  
But at the end of it all, how good could he really be, when he was keeping Liam’s heart hostage, and refusing to let it go?  
  


**You're in a car with a beautiful boy, and you're trying not to tell him that you love him**

Theo didn’t know when Liam fell in love with him, but he knew when he had fallen in love with Liam.   
  
They had been in a car, alone together. Liam had been asleep - unconscious, rather, and Theo had been driving away from the abandoned Zoo where they had been trying to lure the hunters.   
  
It had been a contentious day, and seeing Liam go into a rage had been frightening, but seeing how hard he had tried to stop himself from killing Nolan had been inspiring. He had broken his own bones over and over again to try and prevent himself from killing someone that, as far as Theo was concerned, Liam had every right to kill. He had only told Nolan to run, instead of tearing him apart himself, because he had seen Liam try to stop himself.   
  
Liam didn’t want to kill Nolan, and Theo had taken that in, pulled that part of him out and stopped himself from killing Nolan as well. He followed Liam’s example, and held back when normally, when in the past, he would have had no hesitation when it came to clawing Nolan’s throat out, or snapping his neck. It would have been so easy to just end it - and would it have even been wrong? Nolan had harmed them, and would try again, Theo was sure. Letting him go was a risk, but Liam had wanted it, so Theo had let it happen.   
  
As Liam had come to in the car, Theo had explained to him how hard he had tried, and he was proud of Liam for holding back. Along with the pride, though, something else was blooming inside of him. Liam was compassionate, even for people who had hurt him, badly, and Theo had never seen that before, he didn’t understand it, but he wanted to. He was glad that they were _both_ there, that they were _both_ safe, and that was a first for Theo. He had never cared about anyone else, except for when it came to Liam, apparently.   
  
He had pulled him back with the Ghost Riders, and he had pulled him back now. Theo hadn’t necessarily understood it at the time, but that was the moment he had fallen in love with the other man, and looking back, it was so painfully obvious to him.   
  
He had held onto it, for years and years. He didn’t know if Liam knew, he didn’t want to say anything, because he knew that Liam didn’t want him to, so Theo did his level best to hold his tongue. In moments like this, though, when they were both hurt, and tired, and it had been so close, he wanted to.   
  


**And you're trying to choke down the feeling, and you're trembling** **  
****  
**He wanted to tell Liam, because what if the next time they fought something, one of them fell? He wanted Liam to know, because he loved him, he did, and wouldn’t it be terrible if he were to die, and Liam didn’t know that?  
  
Or would it be so terrible?   
  
If he were to die, and Liam didn’t know how he felt, it might give Liam the chance to move on, the chance that he deserved, a chance that Theo was currently holding him back from, and shouldn’t Liam get to have that? Theo was too selfish to push Liam away, to let him go, but if he passed, if he fell in battle, if he died protecting him, and then Liam could move on, wouldn’t that be the best thing?   
  
It was for the best if Liam didn’t know, or if he did, that it was left unspoken. Liam didn’t want to be with him. Theo knew that, he had known it for as long as he had known that Liam was in love with him. He had known it for as long as he knew that he had been in love with Liam, and he was certain of the fact that he had been in love first, but this? This was what they were supposed to be. They were friends, defenders, protectors together, but never more.   
  
So Theo took a deep breath, shoving every word that he wanted to say to Liam deep inside of him, because he owed Liam that much. Because he owed him that much and so much more. It was hard, and it hurt, but it had been hard and hurting for years, this wasn’t a new feeling, and it wasn’t something that would go away, either. Theo had gotten good at suppressing it, but moments like this? When he was alone with Liam, when they had just put their lives on the line, and trusted so much in each other to come out of it alive, it was difficult.   
  
He gripped the steering wheel instead, to keep his hands from shaking, and squeezed until he was white-knuckled, to exert the self control necessary to not ruin Liam’s life.   
  
He loved Liam too much to tell him.  
  


**But he reaches over and touches you, like a prayer for which no words exist** **  
****  
**But Liam was in the car, too, and he wasn’t unconscious this time. Liam was observant, and smart, and he noticed Theo’s grip on the wheel change. He reached out, taking Theo’s right hand off of the wheel, lacing his fingers through it, and Theo felt his heart rate picking up as Liam squeezed his hand.  
  
There was no way that Liam didn’t know. If he somehow hadn’t known up until this very moment, he surely did now, because the way that he took Theo’s hand? It felt like everything that Theo had ever wanted. It was a simple touch, a touch that came without words, but Theo could feel it throughout the entirety of his being.   
  
He and Liam had spent so much time punching each other because they didn’t know how else to touch each other without having to say something that neither of them could say for different reasons, but here, in this car, tonight, Liam apparently finally broke that one barrier. It would seem small, maybe, to anyone else, but to Theo, this was everything.   
  
A gentle touch wasn’t something that he had known in a long time, and the fact that Liam had isolated Theo’s feelings, had realized that he was struggling, drowning, and taken the moment to reach out for him, even though Theo knew they would never speak of it again once they got out of the car made him feel immense in a world where he normally felt so small.   
  
Knowing that Liam loved him, and wouldn’t say it, was one thing. Having Liam reach out for him and touch him was another entirely, and it was something that Theo had wanted so badly for so long that he didn’t know what to do, so he just drove. He kept his left hand on the wheel, his eyes on the road, and his right hand lying in the space between their seats, fingers tangled with Liam’s.  
  


**And you feel your heart taking root in your body** **  
****  
**He knew that he couldn’t say anything, because if he said it, he would have to acknowledge what was happening and he knew that if he did that, it would stop. If he said anything at all to Liam right now, he was certain that Liam would pull his hand back, and that would be that.  
  
Of course, it was going to happen sooner or later anyways. Theo would park the car, and Liam would remove his hand from Theo’s to undo his seatbelt, he’d be out of the car, and gone before Theo could even think about asking him to stay, and Theo didn’t want that moment to come any sooner than it had to. He didn’t know how long this would last, but he was determined not to be the reason that it ended.   
  
He felt Liam’s presence settling in his body, in his heart, and it felt right. God, it felt so right, holding Liam’s hand, in the dead of night, driving back. It didn’t matter that it was filthy, it didn’t matter that there was blood, it didn’t matter that once they got out of the car the moment would be over, because for right now, Theo could take this feeling and he could imagine what it might be like, if the world wasn’t constantly getting in their way.   
  
He could imagine what it might be like if he hadn’t ruined everything - if he hadn’t forced Corey to do bad things, if he hadn’t tried to kill Liam and his friends. If he had been a good guy all along, he could have had this. He could have had Liam without making Liam’s friends uncomfortable, but he did. They let him in, and they trusted him, but just enough to protect them.   
  
They didn’t trust him enough to let him have the best of them, and he couldn’t blame them for that. He didn’t trust himself enough to ask for Liam, because he couldn’t give him everything that he deserved, and how could he spend a lifetime trying to live up to an unknown? There had to be better out there for Liam, because Theo? He was the bottom of the barrel, and _why_ Liam loved him, he would never understand, but in this moment, their hands joined, he could not only sense Liam’s love, but he could feel it.   
  
This moment, he felt, he could hold onto happily for years to come. If it was the most he ever got, it would be good enough, because how could it not be? How could someone like Liam Dunbar loving him ever _not_ be enough?  
  


**Like you've discovered something you didn't even have a name for.**

There weren’t words for what he felt, for what he knew they had, at least inside. As he stared out at the dark, winding road, he felt a looseness in his chest that he hadn’t felt in a long time.   
  
Maybe they would never say it. Maybe they would never be together, and maybe there was no term for what they were, for what they had, but it was beautiful, and it felt so good. Theo loved Liam, and for some reason, some reason that Theo was certain he would never, ever understand, Liam loved him back.   
  
Theo didn’t need anymore than exactly what Liam wanted to give him, and tonight, that was his hand, on a dark, late night highway, their hearts beating in tandem. He gave Liam’s hand a squeeze in return, to let him know, without any doubt, that he felt the same way.   
  
They didn’t need to say it.   
  
They didn’t need to _be_ together.   
  
They were in love, and it was so much more than Theo had ever thought he would have.   
  
They were in love, and it was enough.


End file.
